"They believe that the
ceremony fulfills the double object of exorcising the vermin whose
multiplication would be a real calamity, and of imparting fecundity
to the trees, the fields, and even the cattle"; and they imagine
that the more the ceremony is prolonged, the greater will be the
crop of fruit next autumn. In Bohemia they say that the corn will
grow as high as they fling the blazing besoms into the air. Nor are
such notions confined to Europe. In Corea, a few days before the New
Year festival, the eunuchs of the palace swing burning torches,
chanting invocations the while, and this is supposed to ensure
bountiful crops for the next season. The custom of trundling a
burning wheel over the fields, which used to be observed in Poitou
for the express purpose of fertilising them, may be thought to
embody the same idea in a still more graphic form; since in this way
the mock-sun itself, not merely its light and heat represented by
torches, is made actually to pass over the ground which is to
receive its quickening and kindly influence.
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